Not That I'm Anxious or Anything, but...

All work and no sleep makes Lady Tiara a dull girl (and kind of a raving bitch). My insomnia has shifted into high gear lately. I have the insomnia trifecta: trouble falling asleep when you first get into bed, frequent waking up in the middle of the night, and waking up really early. Most people have one type. I get them all, over the course of the night. I’m extremely grumpy, and I’m beginning to wonder how long a person can go with only 4 to 5 hours of sleep a night. (If you are one of those type-A personalities who can get by on only 4 hours a night indefinitely, I really don’t want to hear about it.) So, a combination of lots of stress and not enough sleep has made life exceptionally dull lately, hence the lack of posts.

But for the last few days, I was in Austin for work, so that finally gives me something to write about (posts and not very exciting photos to come). The whole process of traveling adds to my insomnia: 1) I get stressed out before traveling, so I lie awake at night making lists in my head of everything I need to do or pack, or I have nasty anxiety dreams about missing planes, and 2) I have trouble sleeping in strange beds.

I have been trying to figure out why traveling makes me so anxious. I like traveling in general. I love going new places. And I’m not particularly afraid of flying. While waiting in the Austin airport, I started making a list in my head and I’ve taken somewhere around 160 flights. My first flight was when I was 4. My first international flight was when I was 5. I am a fairly seasoned traveler. But two things give me pause.

1) Flying makes me feel all eurgh. I have severe motion sickness. I threw up on every domestic flight I took from ages 4 to 13. (For some reason, this never happened on the international flights since I would generally fall asleep five minutes after take-off. I suspect the use of drugs, for which I can’t really blame the adults.) I still often feel like puking when I fly, although I am usually able to hold it together. (Still, the first thing I do when I take my seat is check the seat pocket for the barf bag. I like to be prepared.) I also get severe pain and pressure in my ears, which feels like someone jabbing a letter opener into my eardrums. It’s awesome.

2) I absolutely refuse to ever miss a plane or be rushed in any way, so I like to get to the airport really early. For example, my flight to Austin was Saturday at 12:30. I woke up at 7 a.m. and threw a few last-minute things into my already packed bag. I was in the car at 9:15. I arrived at the airport at 10, and I was checked in and through security by 10:30. For a 12:30 flight. Yes, I know this is totally insane, but it’s all my mother’s fault. When I was a kid, she was late for every flight she ever took. She’s the woman running through the airport rushing to make her plane. Every time. And I was the kid she was dragging behind her. I hated this. I never understood why we just couldn’t leave earlier for the airport. Or why we had to wait until the last possible minute to call a cab. Once, when I was 7, I stopped running and said to her, “Someday I’ll be a grown-up, and I won’t have to fly with you anymore, and I’m never going to miss a plane or have to run through the airport. I’ll be on time!” She just rolled her eyes, but I stuck to that resolution. I’ve never missed a plane, and I’ve never had to run through an airport (except for last year’s unfortunate incident at Charles de Gaulle, but that was entirely the fault of Air France, a.k.a., the bastards who wouldn’t let a couple on their honeymoon sit together). So, I blame most of this on my mother (to be fair, my father also likes to get to the airport with a few hours to spare, so it may be something in my genetic makeup).